back. all right. willie, if it's way too early, what time is it? >> it's "morning joe." we'll see you back here tomorrow from south beach. stick around now for our friend, chuck todd. >> thank you. 24 hours to go. mitt romney has a commanding lead in florida thanks to big money and aggressive tactics. does a big win tomorrow seal the deal or will a romney victory just make the pendulum swing back to the tea party? no matter what the result is tomorrow, newt gingrich says he's not going anywhere. it will be a long month before the primary calendar gives gingrich some home field advantage. can he go the distance and how much will a prolonged fight damage the republicans for november? just who is making the call tomorrow? we'll look at the many faces of the florida electorate and the big money that it takes to win votes in the fourth largest state. >> we're close to being the third. it's monday, january 3rd, 2012. this is "the daily rundown." 24 hours to go.

there's no sedation. let's get to my first read of the morning. the florida fight coming to a very bitter end with just 24 hours to go before the florida polls close. mitt romney has pulled away in many of the polls and is leading newt gingrich by double digits. romney is not letting up. the make newt mad and mitt meaner strategy was on full display this weekend. >> the first debate of course the audience was quiet and speaker gingrich said that threw him off. he can't debate before a quiet audience. the next audience was very loud. he said that threw him off. he can't debate before a really loud audience. it's like goldilocks. can't have it this way. has to be just so. >> echoing ads playing on repeat around around the state. romney railed on gingrich's work for freddie mac. >> he's now finding excuses everywhere he can. he's on tv this morning going from station to station complaining about what he thinks were the reasons he's had difficulty here in florida.

your problem in florida is you worked for freddie mac at a time that freddie mac was not doing the right thing for the american people and you're selling influence in washington. >> the lesson the romney campaign learned from iowa, gingrich has an ability to come back from the dead and even with a decisive lead this time romney is taking nothing for granted. >> we were getting just railed on by speaker gingrich and didn't respond well back in south carolina so we decided we'll respond. politics ain't bean bags. we've made our our message is out loud and clear. >> gingrich has also stepped up character attacks. since before the new hampshire primary, he's labeled romney a massachusetts moderate. this weekend moderate apparently became too complementary. >> i am in fact the legitimate heir of the reagan movement, no the some liberal from massachusetts. conservatives will come together and decide they don't want a massachusetts liberal. the only effective vote to stop a massachusetts liberal from becoming our nominee is to vote

for newt gingrich. >> and though he's trailing by 15 points in our poll in florida, gingrich says he has no intention of letting up. he's prepared to take the fight with romney back to florida. >> we will go all of the way to the convention. this is a straightout contest for the next four or five months. when you take all of the nonromney votes it's likely that at the convention there will be a nonromney majority and maybe a substantial one. my job is to convert that to a pro-gingrich majority. he can bury me for a very short amount of time with four or five or six times as much money. most of it raised on wall street from the guys who got bailouts from the government. in the long run, the republican party is not going to nominate the founder of romney care, a liberal republican who is pro-abortion, pro-gun control and pro-tax increase. it ain't going to happen.

>> mitt romney wins florida primary tomorrow, should we surprised to see the tea party rally around newt gingrich after gingrich's first they rallied against newt and a bit for romney. the establishment rallied around party and now the part of the party that can't stomach romney may show new signs of life with gingrich's endorsement saturday night in west palm beach by herman cain. >> i hereby officially and enthus a enth enthusiastically endorse newt gingrich. >> look at the players in the establishment who are fighting so hard against him. they want to crucify him because

he's tapped into that average every day american tea party grassroots movement. if for no other reason rage against the machine, vote for newt. annoy a liberal. vote newt. keep this vetting process going. keep the debate going. >> questions for gingrich to keep this going. number one, where does he finds a victory before march? four caucuses, no debates for three weeks? where does he focus on? is nevada a probability? unlikely. maybe arizona. tough. and initial michigan poll showed it closer than it should have been. that's a romney home state. february could be a long, cold month and is there more money for that super pac? that's a big question we have going forward. heading into tomorrow's primary, let's look into the new poll that shows mitt romney on his way to a potentially decisive victory.

romney leads gingrich by 15 points. across the board lead. romney beats gingrich in electability but also with voters that care about issue position and leads among those whose values are most important and voters who choose experience as the top quality. more than $24 million has been spent on ads in florida. 16 million of that by romney and his soup pac and it accomplished its goal. gingrich is so unacceptable to many conservatives that when santorum is taken out of the mix, he's at 16% in our poll, romney's lead actually grows. not newt. our numbers show it will be an uphill task for gingrich to reverse that momentum according to the miami herald. over 534,000 floridians have cast a ballot early or absentee. romney leads two to one. that's the stage for tomorrow. if mitt romney wins florida on the heels of unrelenting series

of attacks on newt gingrich and that appears to be paying off. with me now, mel martinez, a romney supporter and now the regional chairman with jpmorgan chase. nice to see you. >> good morning, chuck. good to be with you. >> as you might expect the gingrich campaign is not happy with how members of the romney establishment if you will have gone after speaker gingrich. here is fred thompson yesterday on "meet the press" on what he calls the romney attack machine. >> let's just say that romney is the nominee. he basically is plays mr. nice guy until someone gets close to him and then he unleashes his attack machine. that's what happened in iowa. it's what's happening in florida spending millions of dollars. i think they spent $16 million on television ads alone in florida. >> do you agree with senator thompson that mitt romney's lead and now decisive lead is basically thanks mostly to this

negative campaign against speaker gingrich? >> i think governor romney is winning in florida because he's run a great campaign in florida. he has a lot of support in this state. he's winning across the board as you pointed out among hispanic his lead is enormous. it's an across the board thing. this is not like in the contest for political office people don't get rough at times. in fact, the governor has been the victim of that. newt gingrich has not spared him. he was calling him a massachusetts liberal in some of the pieces you just played. that's not complementary. the question really is, is this party ready to rally around a nominee that will have the best opportunity to defeat obama and who will make a good president at this point in time in the economic cycle in which we find ourselves. i think the people are beginning to come to the realization that governor romney gives us the best shot to not only live in november but to have a president who can really effectively lead the country and bring us together and deal with economic problems we face.

>> one of the more shocking things in our last nbc/"wall street journal" poll and i talked to republicans concerneded about this is mitt romney's personal rating upside down in poll speak. negative rating higher than his positive rating. the last time we saw that with any nominee at this point in time was john kerry. he had a short primary season and had the spring to basically fix his problems with the middle of the electorate. are you concerned mitt romney is not going to have the same amount of time that a john kerry had to make himself competitive with the incumbent? >> i don't think there's any question that it's critical that we begin to come together and the candidate have an opportunity to focus on the general election. i think governor romney has become a better candidate over the last couple weeks. campaigning in a large, diverse state like florida which you know so well, is a microcosm of our country has really made gor romney better and shown his

strengths and ability to reach across all expespectrums of the electorate. i think he can get it together and be an effective general election candidate. i cringe at the blood letting as a republican and if we continue this to june, this only benefits president obama so i would hope that we can rally around the obvious nominee at some point when that becomes obvious. i'm not for shortening the process or any of that. i think at some point it becomes clear that governor romney is our nominee. speaker gingrich is not acceptable to majority of republicans and we need to rally around the person that will be our standard bearer. >> two quick questions. the tone of the rhetoric on immigration. can you concerned jeb bush expressing he wishes governor romney would lighten up on the dream act and other issues. are you in that same camp? >> i think the governor and i -- governor bush and i agree on the immigration issue. i've been -- i think the governor and i have had good

conversations on this. i think he understands the issue very well. he has his views. we differ on them to some degree but the truth is he's not someone as speaker tried to label him who is anti-immigrant. talk about negative campaigning. that was negative. there's no truth to that. i think governor romney's language continues to be better. and more understanding of the way that tone is so important. it's more important in tone than specifics of policy and so i will continue to counsel with him and we have a good relationship and a good understanding and it's not so much about differences in policies but a lot about tone. >> i want to play for you something governor romney said at a friday hispanic conference in miami on cuba. it raised eyebrows with me. take a listen. >> there is a time coming soon where cuba will be free. that's going to happen.

we're going to have to get organized for it. we're going to have to recognize that the people there want freedom as people do all over the world and america can't sit back. i will not only say something when fidel castro leaves this earth, i will do something and be behind the voices of freedom here and voices of freedom there. we'll help cuba become free. >> a lot of politicians make promises during presidential campaigns about what to do about cuba. it sounded like governor romney was promising to get actively involved in cuba itself to try to do these things. what did you hear out of that? >> what i hear on that is i think he's going to be a strong supporter for the dissident movement in cuba, growing and rising dissident movement inside cuba and to be of assistance in whatever we can with the voices of freedom. pretty much like we did at the end of the cold war when the eastern european countries founded the united states through president reagan, pope john paul and margaret thatcher,

there were world leaders willing to stand on the side of freedom and to assist those who were the voices of freedom within cuba. i don't think he's talking military action. i don't think he's talking about anything crazy. it is standing solidly with those who seek to have a different system in cuba that allows freedom to flourish. >> and very quickly, this issue of the obama administration lightening up travel restrictions to cuba, how is that playing? that splits the cuban community down in miami, doesn't it? >> it does. a lot of people like myself who have family there. it's important to be able to support them and assist them in some way. those family ties are deep in the cuban community as you well know, chuck. i think it does become a bit of a split issue. you know, i think there is also a lot of concern in the cuban community about the fact that a lot of the travel which whenever i hear people at dinner conversation saying i have friends in cuba last week, it's nothing more than tourism under

the guys of a cultural exchange or whatever and subtlety behind that kind of thing. i think we're only aiding the regime by allowing subtle tourism into cuba at a time when they continue to suppress people in the very dramatic way. my hope is that the cuban people will have the opportunity to live in freedom. the castro brothers will leave the scene and will allow other voices -- half a century of governing or misgoverning a country, that seems long enough. we'll have a better situation if that can happen in cuba. >> senator mel martinez, always good to talk to you, sir. >> bye-bye. >> up for grabs. the florida hispanic vote may be the key to victory in november but up next we're busting up some conventional wisdom about the state's fastest growing electorate and how they'll impact this election. plus, the money race. newt gingrich is being outspent four to one by team romney. will gingrich's billionaire backer up the ante? that's ahead.

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florida's primary will be a test of strength among republican candidates. they are courting hispanic voters in florida knowing their support in the primary and november could hold the keys to the white house. ron allen has a terrific piece on the diversity of the hispanic population in florida. ron, take it away.

>> reporter: thanks, chuck. we tried to take a step back and look at this community because it is the nation's largest minority group and they are becoming more politically active. in florida, t first primary state where these voters really matter unlike in iowa or new hampshire or some place like that. so we spent the past couple days driving around talking to latino voters about their increasing political clout. in florida the campaign has a distinctive latin beat. >> i'm mitt romney. >> i'm newt gingrich. >> aggressive push to court the latino voters, now more than 13% in florida important in the gop primary and probably even more crucial in november. is this vote in a general election going to swing the tide one way or another? >> florida is always a close state. it can. >> reporter: patrick publishes a

90-year-old multilingual newspaper in tampa. >> in florida we have a mix of cubans, puerto ricans, mexicans, colombi colombians. >> reporter: florida has seen a big influx of immigrants from places like puerto rico, american citizens who tend to support democrats. who do you like? >> i vote for obama. >> reporter: do you think you'll always vote democrat? >> yes. i think. for now. >> reporter: president obama won the latino vote by two to one. but then latino voters helped send republican marco rubio to the u.s. senate. >> the big priority right now should be jobs. >> reporter: latinos have a generation divide. adrian martinez and his wife, megan, are republicans. their daughter prefers democrats. and their son -- >> independent. >> reporter: right down the middle.

don't listen to your grandparents or your mother? >> no. >> reporter: they are a delightful family. you find families like that across this state. young people getting more involved in the process. when you look beyond florida, there are states like texas and california that have even larger latino populations so this is an issue that goes beyond florida and out west of course many of the latinos are mexican americans with different issues and different concerns. no one size fits all approach in this community. >> that's what's great about florida there. it is diverse issues, diverse hispanic backgrounds. ron allen, again, a great way of displaying it. thank you much. the diverse hispanic population can make or break any candidate in this swing state. although republicans currently have the advantage with cuban americans, the fight is on to make inroads with other hispanic groups. joining me now is alfonso. the former head of the u.s. office of citizenship under president george h.w. bush. thank you for coming in and

talking about how -- >> thank you for having me. >> i want to put up this statistic on florida hispanic. coming from miami, they assume all hispanic americans outside of florida are cuban. according to a u.s. census, 32% are cuban. 28% are puerto rican. mexicans, 9%. 25% others which i would mostly central and south americans is my understanding. there's the challenge for the republican party. it's not -- it's only a third of the hispanic vote based republican cuban. >> that's the exciting thing, i think about florida is that the latino community is very diverse. i think cubans this time around will go with a republican candidate. they are angry at president obama for easing the embargo. you mentioned the puerto rican community and they are mostly in the i-4 corridor. they are very independent. so they could swing. they could go for obama or they

could go for the republican candidate. and then the rest you have a group of central american voters so it's a very diverse community where immigration is not the most important issue. for cubans it's the embargo. for pouerto ricans the issue of the unemployment and the economy and status which they care deeply about. immigration is not the number one issue and perhaps that's one of the reasons governor romney has an edge with latino voters in florida because immigration is not such an important issue and rhetoric and immigration hasn't been really that great. >> what's been interesting in florida is he dialed it back a little bit. not enough for your goal of trying to get more spanish to go to the republican cause. >> i think the romney campaign is starting to clarify his position on immigration. >> you say that with a smile. you mean clarify realizing this is a general election problem?

>> remember initially he said he would veto the dream act. now he said he believes in the dream act to give legal status to those here willing to serve in the military. he's talking more about revamping the legal visa programs available. i expect as he moves through other states including nevada where the hispanic electorate is even higher even within republican primaries, he'll start clarifying his position and the reality is that republicans cannot win the white house if they don't get 40% of the latino vote. and right now with the rhetoric and immigration, i don't know how he could win nevada and colorado which are key to win. >> interesting to watch romney throughout the campaign as conservative credentials get questioned left and right, the one issue where he's been to the right of his chief opponents, he used immigration to cause problems. newt gingrich on immigration and

on latino politics, i know you just interviewed him, would you argue he does a better job talking to hispanics as a whole than mitt romney? >> absolutely. i think the conventional wisdom that republican primary voters are anti-immigrant, i just don't buy it. gingrich understands that for republicans as long as border security is central to your plan, they are supportive of a guest worker program or some sort of legalization. his plan is palatable to latino. when he announced it, he went up in the polls. this is my position. he framed it in conservative terms and he said i'm willing to take the heat for it. >> rick perry got pummeled on this issue. >> you can argue that perry went down not because of position on immigration but because of his poor performance in the debates. >> didn't know how to defend the position. it was the issue that romney used to expose this. >> when romney says that in-state tuition for undocumented immigrants is a magnet for illegal immigration,

for those mexican voters who understand immigration, they think, you know, who is coming here illegally? a poor laid why her son thinking i'm going to go to texas and i want to send my son to texas a&m and pay in-state tuition. it's ridiculous. he has to be careful. if he does become the nominee, he'll have to explain those positions. >> quickly, the caribbean community is a growing -- doesn't get classified fully hispanic. sometimes it does. that's -- give me a quick take on that. >> i think the haitian vote in florida is very interesting. republicans have traditionally reached out to haitians. remember republicans had a mayor of north miami who was of haitian origin. but they are angry and they have confrontation with cubans over the immigration law and the special benefits cubans get. i think republicans should engage the haitian community because it's important in florida. >> thanks for coming in. >> thank you so much. >> talking about this, it is the

most diverse hispanic community maybe in the country. the state of florida. thank you very much. a major status update coming for facebook. this is one we all want to be poked on. the market rundown is next. and cash infusion. our "the daily rundown" look at the billionaire backer the biggest financial force behind the gingrich campaign. first today's trivia question. what percentage of florida's population is 65 and older? tweet me the answer. the first correct googler will get follow mug from us. look! the phillips' lady!

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opening bell just rang. that means it's time for the

rundown. i can spoke you for an ipo? >> you can. you can even friend me if you would like. we've got a new ipo that we're expecting to see the filings for this week. as you probably know, it's facebook. there has been a lot of speculation, a lot of excitement around this because if they do come out with their filing, which is expected to come as early as tuesday night, the expectation is that you will see an ipo that could raise $10 billion, which would value this company at $100 billion and that would make this the largest internet ipo ever. a lot of excitement building around that making us think we could be back in a situation where you see internet ipos but the other thing we're watching today is this morning the talks over in europe. the eu leaders meeting today. there is not any announcement on a deal reached for greece just yet. that's why the futures are opening down. looks like they'll open down by 80 or 85 points right now because there had been all these expectations building in that we could see a deal as early as

today. once again, it's europe that is really driving the market and right now it's not going to be pretty. >> becky, every time i hear about a deal in europe, i just hear charlie brown's parents. >> la, la, la. >> we'll believe it when we see it. thanks very much.

the disparity would be greater if it wasn't for the sheldon household. the billionaire who kept gingrich's campaign afloat with $10 million in donations over the last three weeks. michael and john are joining us now. wiscons welcome to both of you. what does sheldon want? >> very good question. $22 billion personal fortune gambling empire that stretches from the vegas strip to singapore. he has a lot of business interests. he's under investigation by the justice department over allegations of bribery but no question what he cares about most, what he's been most public about is israel, support for israel, staunch supporters of netanyahu. owns a newspaper in israel that has featured gingrich on the front page. promoted netanyahu.

attacked his critics and also very hard stand on iran. so he's got this ideological really hawkish israeli stance that is basic part of his bond with gingrich but some of what he said on this issue is controversial. we had a report on the "today" show the other day including a quote from him talking about how he wished he had served in the israeli army rather than the american army. that will be problematic for some people. >> we know sheldon adelson has been the republican go-to guy in vegas for a long time. big nonunion hotel. how likely is he that he'll keep this up? he'll keep funding gingrich and keep sending him checks? >> i can only speak for myself and not you, chuck. $5 million is not much money for sheldon adelson.

it is for normal people. >> you vegas guys. >> exactly. that's the kind of pocket change we find under our couch cushions. $10 million for a guy worth $22 billion is not that much. there is a history between sheldon adelson and newt. this is personal loyalty. the first $5 million it looked like newt gingrich was going down and then made the south carolina comeback and suddenly sheldon adelson looks like a political genius and his wife who wrote the second $5 million check. i think they will wait and see what happens after florida. they are coming to nevada. you guys always forget nevada, chuck. they are coming to nevada next. we'll see what he does once he gets here. >> i have to say is nevada competitive or not? let me ask you that. there's been speculation that adelson is forcing gingrich to compete there in a way that maybe strategically he ought to

lessen the importance of it. >> in 2008, the exit polls showed that about a quarter of the vote was lds. mitt romney won here easily as you recall. he got 51% of the vote. john mccain didn't even compete here. ron paul finished second with 14%. romney is the favorite. he's been organizing here. never left actually after 2008. but listen, i think gingrich has some support here. don't forget ron paul did very, very well here in 2008. i think they are more organized this time. i don't think you can discount paul here or in any of the caucus states. >> let me ask you this about what's going on here with adelson. what's been surprising to me is the romney campaign has not -- they've attacked newt gingrich on everything from his past but not for having a loan backer keeping his campaign alive which to me is surprising.

>> not publicly. privately they may have raised some questions about it. they have not made a public issue. i think part of it is because they are going after especially in florida the jewish vote. they don't want any distance suggesting between themselves and gingrich on israel. but take that -- take a step back here. what's really extraordinary about this adelson money is in this new post-citizens united era how one guy can resurrect the candidacy and keep it afloat after iowa gingrich was on the ropes. he had very little prospects. it was that $5 million check from adelson in south carolina that bankrolled all of the attack ads against romney that revived his candidacy. one interesting remark, sid,

adelson's consultant said to me, what he's doing is no different than what joe kennedy did helping his son. remember one of the most famous in politics, don't buy extra votes. i'll be damned if i'll pay for a landslide. i don't think gingrich is there yet. interesting to have that parallel right now. >> my favorite rumor is that somehow this is some sort of rivalry between adelson and steve wynn because he's a big romney guy. do you buy it? >> steve wynn has played it very coy. he's not come out for anybody. it's interesting that history between sheldon adelson and steve wynn. they used to really hate each other. they bonded in recent years about their disdain for the president. that's one of the reasons i think that the other candidates are not doing anything about sheldon adelson. they figure even if newt goes down, they want sheldon adelson's money later on to try to beat obama so i don't think they are going to go after him

at all. >> all right. are you going to promise me nevada is going to be competitive or not? we're treating it like a major state. >> it is a major state. it's the most competitive state in the country. come here, chuck. >> all right. >> just very quickly, adelson's people have made it clear regardless of who gets the nomination, he will be there helping the republican nominee. they want obama out of the white house. >> always good to see you. thank you for getting up early, john. >> all right, chuck. >> thanks, mike. up next, our political panel is here. msnbc supertuesday tomorrow as floridians go to the polls. primary coverage starts at 6:00 p.m. eastern. before you go to break, it's the white house soup of the guy. it's the greek bailout lentil stew. we'll be right back. [ male announcer ] to the 5:00 a.m. scholar. the two trains and a bus rider.

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>> by participating in free election, the iraqi people have rejected the ideology of the terrorist and demonstrated the kind of courage that is always the foundation of self-government. >> daily flashback. it was this day in 2005 when for the first time in half a century, iraqis participated in a free election despite threats of attacks on polling stations more than 8 million people turned out to vote and a bunch of members of congress, mostly republicans, showed up with purple fingers at the state of the union which i believe was about a day or two later. all right. rick santorum will return to the trail today africanstericanslte stops to care for his daughter who was rushed to the hospital for developing pneumonia in both lungs.

he'll spend the next two days in missouri, minnesota, colorado and nevada. they are all february caucus states. he spoke to supporters last night from his daughter's hospital room. >> my daughter ran into a health problem. she's on the mend and she went through a very, very tough time the last 48 hours and this afternoon she made really a remarkable turn and i'm just feeling so blessed and wanted to take this opportunity for anybody who was praying for her just to say thank you. >> msnbc analyst and also a blogger and this man needs no introduction. an msnbc contributor and sometimes on the other side of this desk. nice to see you. let's jump into florida here and this issue mostly now everybody

thinks they know the writing on the wall. crazier things have happened. assuming romney comes out of florida with strong momentum, the question is how long is this campaign going to go. is it good? is it bad? here's various arguments on that and we'll talk about that. >> we see these pundits and elites and far away washington, d.c. beltway telling the electorate that by florida it's going to be all wrapped up and we'll have our nominee. i say don't let that happen. >> it could go on quite a while which would not be too our benefit. >> usually winners come out of very tough primaries and they make these candidates stronger, tougher, and battle tested and i think it's great that everyone is talking about the republicans right now. >> jennifer ruben, majority in florida would like to see a quick nomination process. majority of republicans. we know john mccain feels that way. obviously some gingrich supporters don't. the chairman of rnc is trying to spin this. we've seen numbers overall with

the electorate. he has problems and he needs time to fix it. a long primary fight good or bad? >> pluses and minuses on both sides. as a matter of numbers it will take a while because republicans now have a system that is not winner take all in all states as you know. he can't technically wrap it up until april. it will go on. the question is how vigorously it's contested and to what extent he is able to smooth out some of these problems, assert himself. it's been an excellent week for romney. he's getting other issues behind him on his taxes. he's beginning to come up with a defense on the bain issues making himself as defender of capitalism which is popular on the right. whether he likes it or not, it will be competitive at least through april. and to some extent i think you're right. needs that time to continue to consolidate his support. >> in the history of the "wall street journal" poll we saw the only basic nominee at this point in time that had net negative

like romney was john kerry. it did go to super tuesday. wesley clark won a couple southern primaries but he got to wrap it up. howard dean was in and out. essentially kerry got to act more like the nominee and the party let him do it. how badly do you think mitt romney needs this time? >> i think he needs it very much. if you think about what happened in '04 with kerry, you had howard dean behind kerry and that was important and within the party there was a lot of pressure that said we don't want an extended fight. we want to get behind our guy. >> they had the same attitude. get bush. same attitude republicans had. getwom obama. >> in 2008 people were nervous about how long it was going on. hillary clinton came and supported barack obama which made a huge difference. i don't know that we're going to see that kind of kumbaya for the republicans. romney has to shore up that

debate. >> all thought they had a political life. >> absolutely. >> newt gingrich, it is due or die. >> he's 68 years old. it's very unlikely that he's running for president again. he knows that. the only thing i would say and i agree with you i don't think he has anything. i put ron paul in there. nothing to lose. >> ron paul isn't going to attack mitt romney every day. he's been a defender of romney. >> here's the argument of newt staying in forever. he said he'll stay in through the convention. earning power. he's wealthy but earning power. as much as he attacks washington, his business is ultimately the kind of gingrich inc. whatever. this is a guy who is part of the washington machinery that makes his money from working with the washington machinery. if the washington republican machinery says, newt, you've had

your run. it may come after march 6th. he just won nine days ago. he won south carolina. it's hard to say now you lost this one. get out. >> it is one primary. i want to burst some conventional wisdom here on the conservative vote because there's been this assumption that santorum or gingrich if one got out, one would benefit. santorum second choice if you reallocate it, romney's lead gross in our poll, 49-33. we can all speculate, my assumption on this is there are voters for santorum uncomfortable with the person stuff with newt gingrich. >> santorum is a serious guy whether you agree with him or not, he has policies. he's not had an erratic past. a solid conservative. a respectable figure. he's a plausible candidate. i think those voters who would go to romney are saying newt is not electable. he has too much baggage. he's too nutty and too out there. i rather take my chances for the

romney camp with gingrich. >> not just it is sort of this layer of work. >> here is the thing. if you're a santorum person, you're going to romney because you're not going to gingrich as a protest vote. that's gingrich's rationale. if they're saying i am not for santorum, i want to beat obama. >> stick around. i want to talk about a cold month that could be february for newt gingrich. what percentage of florida's population is 65 an older? answer, 17.3%. i am going to be looking for the exact figure. i know you guys googled this. perhaps it is surprisingly only four points higher than the national average of 13%. so take that. not as old a state as people think. you're watching "the daily rundown" on msnbc. score did not go bad ♪ ♪ with a free-credit-score-dot-com ♪

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let's bring back the panel. chris cillizza, a cold february, bill clinton had one, newt gingrich, we all knew the loser of this would have a tough february. let's look at the calendar very quickly. we basically have four caucus states and two primaries. no debates until february 22. we have caucuses in minnesota, colorado, maine, nevada in the next three weeks. missouri folks doesn't count at all, straight beauty contest. its caucus is on super tuesday. but chris cillizza, a cold february, where does newt recover? >> i'm looking at the map, chuck. while i would say we like to say most caucuses and primaries are created equal, we know they're not. the one that will get most attention, jon ralston will be happy for me to say nevada.

and arizona and michigan because they're larger states with primaries. both, all three of those, i would be stunned if it was even close with romney. nevada won 51% in 2008. ron paul got 13% or 17% for second place. arizona, same problem. >> jennifer, though, he is battling his own expectations in michigan, it is a home state. arizona strikes me as a place that could be an interesting, conservative electorate. >> on the other hand, he has strong surrogates. jeff flight, hardly a softy when it comes to the issues. i think he has a lot of momentum. it is the best possible scheduling for romney. he is going to have a breather, won't have any debates. >> february was the cold month that basically ended hillary clinton's candidacy, waiting for ohio in march. you have newt gingrich waiting for southern super tuesday. >> also, michigan is problematic for romney, not just because of expectations, but his comments about the auto industry aren't going to play well.

newt will keep pushing this anti-establishment. >> shakeless plugs. go. >> last week, the navy flew its first all female combat mission off the uss vincent, the lieutenant commander was my cousin. congrats to tara, and god bless to all on the vincent. >> shoutout to jean kwon, liberal mayor of oakland that said occupy people should stop using her city as a playground. >> chris. >> john cillizza, my dad, happy birthday. >> that's it for this edition of "the daily rundown." see you here tomorrow in new york as opposed to being in florida. coming up next, kris jansing and at 1:00, andrea mitchell reports. bye-bye. you name it...i've hooked it. but there's one... one that's always eluded me. thought i had it in the blizzard of '93. ha! never even came close.

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good monday morning. i'm kris jansing. get ready for a long,